Plant Communication / Modular Bio Circuits
There is several evidence of "interfloristic" communication. For example mushrooms in the forests connect the roots of any tree to each other. So that they build a kind of network within the forest. Other Trees are able to communicate via a kind of pheromone to warn other trees while their leaves are eaten by animals. The purpose of my experiments will be to reseach this complex of communication between plants. I want to build a bio circuit with different biological moduls. One example could be to bring in a analog signal to a plant, send it via the roots to a mushroom and then back through another plant to a sensor that is able to translate it back into an analog output. That is the basic idea.
some inspiring links:
the battery of the future (german)
plant do really respond to the way we touch them
Leaves signal presence of predators
How to measure
First of all I wanted to find a way not to harm the plant that much. Because most of the conductive metals are reacting with the plant itself causing a poisoning. Therefore I tried to find out the specifics of graphite as a non reactive invasive electrode to measure (whatever) inside the plant. During my research I found a very nerdy, fetish article about a pencil IBM merchandise as a part of the IBM Electrographic (you need to scroll down, after all the picture is finally the article)IBM Electrographic. The next step was to find out by myself which degree of hardness would be best in its conductive characteristics. So I did the same experiment as shown in the article and found out the softer the lead, the better is its conductivity. This has to do with the way graphite lead is manufactured. The specifics of carbon/ graphite you can find here (it is in german).
The next idea was also to measure on the surface of the plant, so I just ordered some electrode pads with a layer of silver and carbon. here is a link to order it